Lone Parent IS, Carer's Premium?

sacapuntas

I receive carer's allowance for caring for my husband. We are splitting, but his new flat is very close to the family home. So long as we remain civil to one another, it is preferable for both of us that I continue to be his carer. Our children are both under 7, so I plan on applying for Income Support once he has moved out. My questions are:

1) The base rate for IS is £67.50. Will I be eligible for the lone parent premium of £17.40? I have no savings, assets, property, etc. (we rent).

2) Will I be eligible for the carer premium of £31?

3) If I am eligible for the carer premium, will that replace my £55.55/week Carer's Allowance, or be in addition to it?

4) If I am eligible for both premiums, are you allowed to elect not to take the carer's premium and instead continue receiving CA, as the rate is higher? I'm guessing not!

5) Is there anything else I need to know or have got horribly wrong?

Many thanks in advance.

Oldernotwiser

In the circumstances you describe, it may be difficult to prove that you're not still a couple and have only "separated" for benefit purposes.

ETA.

I deleted my first sentence as I'd misread your post.

sacapuntas

That's something I'm worried about as well. I have a CAB appointment this coming week to ask whether it's feasible. Our finances will be completely separate as will our residences. We'd have to have interaction for him to see our children, so I figured I could kill two birds with one stone and bring the children to his flat to visit in the evenings so I could do all the cleaning and household stuff and help him cook. I'd have to go by in the mornings as well to help him then, so it'd be about 5 hours a day total every day of the week that I'd end up at his flat helping him, but it would ONLY be to help him as I have no interest in maintaining a romantic relationship with him. If it was as simple as him just hiring someone else to be his carer, I'd be all for it, but he flat-out refuses and I know that if I wasn't caring for him, he'd have no help whatsoever and I don't even want to think about what that would lead to.

I've also drafted a separation agreement that I intend to ask about at my CAB appointment and whether it's necessary/would be helpful to anything. I'm terrified of anyone thinking I'm trying to be funny and just live by him and still act as married and I have no idea how to hammer it home to anyone that it's not the case.

kingfisherblue

I am a carer and a single parent on IS. The carer premium is added to the IS, then £55.55 is taken from it. You get the CA of £55.55, plus IS of just over £40, amounts per week. IS is paid fortnightly.

I don't think there is a lone parent premium on IS any more - you get child tax credits instead. If you already claim them, you need to close down your joint claim and open a new, single claim.

sacapuntas

Thank you for that information. I didn't realize you had to close the tax credits claim and start over. Do you know whether that takes a long time?

And re: IS, so that would be the £40-something (do you know where I could find an exact figure? All that I can find is £67.50) plus the carer's premium of £31, then minus £55.55?

kingfisherblue

I don't have a bank statement handy at the moment, so I can't be sure of the exact figure. IS and CA together come to about £96 a week though.

If you are on IS, you should get the full amount of CTC, plus free school meals, free prescriptions, help with glasses (including a free eye test every two years), council tax benefit, help with rent (through housing benefit or LHA - depends on whether you rent from the council or privately).

You will also need to close down any joint accounts and open a new account in your name.

I put lots of info in another post the other day - I'll try to post a link for you.

ETA: I've found the thread - it was someone asking about separation. Some of the info might be relevant to you, some not.

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/3561513

sacapuntas

Thank you so much for the link! Although now I'm even more worried that I won't be able to continue being his carer/getting CA because it will look suspicious. Hopefully my CAB appointment will give me some solid info.

kingfisherblue

Just to let the OP know that I checked my bank statement and I get £86.26 IS a fortnight, in addition to CA (£55.55 a week). So this is £43.13+£55.55=£98.68 a week - a couple of pounds a week more than I said in a previous post.

epitome

I don't see the problem.....except that you are married.... you are splitting will be living seperately and will logically no longer and can no longer be considered to be "living together as a couple" had you not been married this would be more straight forward. But say someone else is married and their husband goes to work in Hong Kong and earn a good wage.....under those circumstances the DWP would rightly be suspicious and investigate if that marriage was still good, and the husband is still supporting the wife. Under your circumstances, I can't see that your husband could be said to be supporting you still.....unless he is working? Then they may get suspicious.

epitome

kingfisherblue wrote: »

Just to let the OP know that I checked my bank statement and I get £86.26 IS a fortnight, in addition to CA (£55.55 a week). So this is £43.13+£55.55=£98.68 a week - a couple of pounds a week more than I said in a previous post.

You're over 25?

I don't understand why it isn't IS @ £67 per week = £134 a fortnight + 55.55 per week

Ahh you mentioned a carer premium, so the carer premium must be approx £30

(67 + 30) - 55.55 = 43

and you end up with 43 + 55.55 = 98

They like to make things complicated don't they...

sacapuntas

No, my husband isn't working. He's in the support group, main phase of ESA, so that's going down as we're separating. He'll definitely not be supporting me and we're in the process of completely separating our finances. Once he moves out, everything will be entirely separate.

epitome-- I'm 25 and you're right, in this case, they definitely seem to prefer it to be very complicated!